2018 PR Holding Group Ranking: WPP Reclaims Top Spot

WPP benefited from a weaker US dollar to reclaim top spot in 2017 among holding group PR operations in USD terms. On a constant currency basis its growth (+6.4%) took it to almost $1.6bn.

While Interpublic's CMG unit reported $1.5bn, this includes several firms that do not specialise in PR; accordingly Omnicom's PR operations at $1.38bn are likely to be the second-largest in the world.

The holding group table also features good growth from China's BlueFocus Communication Group (+12.3%) and Next 15 (+15.1%) and, in a turnaround, Huntsworth (+9.4%). PROI Worldwide — which remains the largest collection of independent PR firms in the world — grew at an impressive rate in 2017 (+23.6%) after adding several new firms during the year.